Street-level bureaucracy

In the United States' education sector there is a strong demand for teachers in numerous regions across the country. There are currently fifty-one "hot spots" with a demand for educators in these regions. Amongst these fifty-one hot spots, five of the regions are with an incredible need for educators in both the primary and secondary education sector. The areas of desperate need include: Las Vegas, Nevada; the Northern region of Oklahoma; Kansas City, Missouri; the Central region of Arkansas; and the Western region of Mississippi.[6]

The demand for police officers is another occupation that will experience growth over the next ten years. Because urbanized and metropolitan regions are amongst the fastest growing in the United States, that is generally where the demand for these individuals will be.[7]

Firefighters are another case in protective services where an increase in demand is expected over the next decade. A seven percent increase in career outlook is to be expected by the year 2022.[8]

The demand for social workers has an average growth rate in the United States. With a general population increase social workers are needed in all areas of the career field. The demand for social workers is extremely high.[9] The national average for growth in all careers stands at eleven percent, while a projected nineteen percent increase in social work is needed to fulfill the sectors responsibility to the general public.[10]

Corruption in street-level bureaucracy is a violation of the ethical codes of conduct, laws and regulations that have been established by the government and its agencies.[11] An example of corruption would be cases where a police officer or border guard accepted a bribe from a member of the public in return for not enforcing a law or regulation. There are many agencies which define and interpret what is acceptable ethical behavior and what is not.[12] Violation of these rules or ethical codes of conduct by street-level bureaucrats has repercussions that effect not only the person or agency involved, but also the general public that these street-level bureaucracies serve. Neutrality and impartiality in following policies and procedures is what is expected and most remain separate from person feelings or views. Here is a link to a social work case that let personal feelings override their ethical responsibility.[13][14]

Another example for corruption in street-level bureaucracy are black market payments for doctors and nurses, as part of the shadow economy. The term "black market medicine" refers to a variety of illegal actions that individuals take in order to obtain healthcare services for themselves. Such actions include direct payments to doctors in government hospitals to improve one's position on the waiting list (especially for surgeries) or payments to doctors so they will treat the patient personally.[15]

According to Lipsky, many of these street-level bureaucrats will "often spend their work lives in these corrupted world of service... doing the best they can in adverse circumstances" This can highlight the inherent problems associated with the public policy-making process.[16]

Accountability is the means by which these codes are upheld and to ensure moral and ethical practices within these bureaucratic agencies. There is much debate over the methodology of how exactly these agencies should be held accountable. Accountability is divided into five categories: transparency, liability, controllability, responsibility, and responsiveness.[17]

Two major accountability processes are compliance based and performance based. "Traditionally, accountability has involved defining rules and procedures and then employing various means to ensure compliance with these expectations"[18] Performance-based practices rely on standardized processes that measure performance in terms of output and results.[18] Yet compliance based, and performance based accountability has limitations for measuring the efficiency, effectiveness, equity, and economy of the bureaucracy. Furthermore, accountability stems from a multidimensional perspective, which includes the general public the bureaucracy serves, peers and co-workers, office managers, public administrators, and elected officials.

Discretion can be defined as a component in the decision making process that determines an individual's action or non-action.[19] Carrington divides discretion into two major components as the freedom the decision maker has to choose between different actions; and the decision to act or not act through the rules and judgment of the decision maker.[19] Michael Lipsky states street level bureaucrats have discretion because human judgment is in the nature of service work that machines could not replace.[20] Street level bureaucrats are responsible for making appropriate decisions that are appropriate for clients and their situations. Lipsky states all street level bureaucrats will confront situations in which they need to depart from service ideals in order to cope with both expectations from their jobs and the public ideals.

According to Lipsky, the exercise of discretion among street level bureaucrats is critical in how public servants interact with citizens on a daily basis. He claims to understand these acts of discretion once must analyze the outcome of agency performance the public experiences as a combined result of agency rules and street level bureaucrats responses to unsanctioned work.[20] Lipsky said the use of discretion by street level bureaucrats can’t be removed from everyday practice due to the complexity and uncertainty of human service work. Carrington identifies the fear of power abuse as a major reason for the opposition of discretion in the arena of street level bureaucrats and its citizens. In order to control problems in discretionary action there has been a demand for control by understanding the social situations in which discretion varies.[19] Marissa Kelly also examines the use of discretion among street level bureaucrats to assert that discretion can either enhance or inhibit street level bureaucrats’ implementation of justice. She asserts that whether discretion is appropriate or not justice theories need to be further examined.[21]

Lipsky concludes that the lack of resources causes street level bureaucrat to develop simplified routines for processing cases that influence their everyday tasks. These routines for decisionmaking affect public policy.[20] He states that street level bureaucrats are taught implementation skills instead of learning about how to find more resources, knowledge and information that would help them to implement policies more effectively.[22] Hill identifies several implementation resources street level bureaucrats often lack such as; research resources, appropriate resources on how to shape specific policies for their specific situation, and access to expertise and skills training to better their decision-making and awareness in specific challenging situations that arise at the street level.[22] Another key resource that front-line bureaucrats often lack is time to fully assess individual cases. In social services, social workers often have such a large caseload that they can only see social assistance recipients or applicants for a very short time each week. As a result, social workers have to make very rapid decisions as to whether to approve or deny welfare benefits.

It was first argued by Snellen that increasing technological advances (ITA) "deeply challeng[e] [the street-level bureaucrat's] ability to manipulate information."[20][23] Snellen believed it was the ability to manipulate information that gave the SLB's their power. He further argued that as more decisions are made by computers or software, SLB's will lose their discretionary powers and they will shift to other actors.[20][23][24] For example, in the 2010, some government organizations use online application forms for programs in which the computer program, rather than a human front-line bureaucrat, will reject applications which are incomplete.[25] In a pre-technological advances era, a front-line bureaucrat might have used his or her discretion over decisions to allow an application in which some of the information requests are not completed (e.g., due to urgent need on the part of the citizen or the existence of an emergency situation). For example, in the 1960s and 1970s, if a social worker received a hand-written, pen-and-paper application from a homeless person for social assistance, the bureaucrat might approve the application even if the applicant did not have a street address or the required identification documents, to ensure that the applicant remained housed and safe.

However, there are four problems with this thesis. First, it is implied, but never proven, that with the arrival of more technology, discretion at the frontline will diminish or become non-existent.[24] Second, Snellen's definition of the SLB's source of power is too narrow and does not take into account other sources of discretion.[24] Third, this thesis only pertains to particular public organizations and does not apply to more common types of street-level bureaucracies such as police departments, schools, or social welfare departments.[24] Lastly, this theory does not take into account how SLB's and other caseworkers actually utilize this new technology and how that might affect their performance.

In contrast to the curtailment theory, a 2007 study by Jorna and Wagenaar showed that ITA was able to increase the amount of work done while cutting down on inconsistencies.[26] However, the meaning and content of this work was not able to be captured and understood by ITA. A 2004 study by Vitalis and Duhaut highlighted the ambiguous nature of ITA.[27] It was shown that the Internet or other forms of technology were utilized for simpler tasks, and more elaborate and complex matters were dealt with face-to-face with citizens.[25] Vitalis and Duhaut come to the conclusion that a SLB has their discretionary power enhanced by ITA, and citizens benefit from ITA by being better informed of their rights when dealing with SLBs and their institutions.[27] This theory maintains that discretion by the SLB is not hindered in any way by ITA and will continue to do their jobs effectively. This theory also focuses more on how ITA is utilized by both citizens and state agents which puts more emphasis on the ability of ITA to further help and empower SLBs and citizens.[24]